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Larry Byrd: A lifetime of addicting monkeys and apes to
illegal drugs In 1997, anti-cruelty activists
encamped at the entrance to Emory University, home to Yerkes Regional
Primate Research Center, were accosted by a few students who were
certain that what was being alleged as occurring in the Yerkes labs
was incorrect. They based their criticisms on what they felt was
incontrovertible fact: Larry Byrd, a vivisector named in some of
the materials being handed out, had retired. This, they claimed,
proved that the activists had their facts wrong. They said that,
yes, Byrd had performed questionable experiments, but that he was
now gone, and that such experiments would not be allowed today.
2001: Fetal development in rhesus monkeys exposed prenatally
to cocaine. "The similarity of the effects of CGS 15943 and caffeine supports
and extends previous findings suggesting that the behavioral-stimulant
effects of caffeine and other xanthines are mediated through adenosine-antagonist
actions rather than inhibition of PDE activity." "Substantial data have been derived from clinical observations,
clinical studies, and animal studies indicating that prenatal exposure
to cocaine may have detrimental short-term and possibly long-term
effects on the mother, the developing fetus, and the neonate. …Prospective
controlled studies are needed to define further the effects of cocaine
as distinct from other negative influences having an impact on the
developing fetus, the newborn, or the infant." [2001: Maternal
food consumption and body weight increased during pregnancy, and
there were no significant differences among experimental groups.
Although both groups with a history of cocaine exposure had lower
survival rates compared to pair-fed controls, of the fetuses that
survived, fetal heart rate, fetal biparietal diameter, and mean
gestational length were in the normal range for all experimental
groups. Similarly, body weight, biparietal diameter, body length,
and modified Apgar scores at birth did not differ significantly
among experimental groups. The results indicate that surviving fetuses
exhibited normal growth. (From: Fetal development in rhesus monkeys
exposed prenatally to cocaine, above.)] 1991: Characterization of the effects of cocaine and GBR
12909, a dopamine uptake inhibitor, on behavior in the squirrel
monkey. "These data support the hypothesis that the dominance position
of an animal in a group can be a determinant of the behavioral effect
of certain drugs." "To investigate the purported relationship between control
rate and drug rate, squirrel monkeys were trained under a fixed-interval
300-s schedule of stimulus-shock termination, a procedure that engendered
a wide range of response rates. A light illuminated the experimental
chamber during the fixed interval, and the first lever press after
300 s had elapsed terminated the light for 30 s and precluded an
electrical stimulus to the tail." "The acute administration of d-amphetamine (0.01-0.3 mg/kg
IM) resulted in marked increases in the rate of self-grooming, i.e.,
the number of self-grooming bouts initiated per hour, for all subjects
and in decreases in the rate at which subjects groomed other monkeys,
but the drug appeared to have no effect on the rate at which a subject
positioned itself near another monkey." "The behavioral effects of d-amphetamine were studied in a
group of stumptail macaques in a large outdoor enclosure. d-Amphetamine
altered characteristic patterns of aggressive and affiliative behaviors
in adult males that received the drug. Each monkey that received
d-amphetamine increased its aggression toward non-adult animals
in the group and decreased aggression toward adult members." "Heart rate (HR) and mean arterial blood pressure (BP) were
recorded from conscious, chair-restrained squirrel monkeys surgically
prepared with chronically indwelling arterial and venous catheters
. . ." "Mean arterial blood pressure, heart rate, and rectal temperature
were measured from conscious, chair-restrained squirrel monkeys
prepared with chronically indwelling arterial and venous catheters
and temperature probes to determine the magnitude and duration of
the effects of acute intravenous injections of propranolol, phentolamine
and methyl atropine." "Conditioned and adjunctive behaviors were disrupted and suppressed
for different durations at 10.0 mg/kg, a dose which induced convulsive
seizures within 10 minutes after intramuscular injection."
"A device suitable for the continuous measurement of physiological
activity in large, conscious monkeys has permitted the direct recording
of systemic arterial blood pressure and heart rate in caged baboons.
The device comprises a lightweight fiberglass backpack, retained
in place on the baboon by a thoracic elastic band and shoulder straps,
and a flexible stainless steel tether connecting the pack to an
electrocannular slip-ring in the top center of the baboon's cage.
A chronically indwelling arterial catheter inserted retrograde into
the abdominal aorta via the internal iliac artery and connected
to a small pressure transducer on the pack provides direct measurement
of blood pressure and heart rate. Body fluids can be sampled or
drugs administered via an indwelling catheter in the inferior vena
cava. Electrical and fluid connections between the fiberglass pack
and recording and infusion equipment located outside the cage pass
through the flexible tether and remain protected from the subject.
The reliability of the tethering system has been demonstrated in
physiological, pharmacological, and behavioral experiments with
baboons." "Key-pressing behavior in the squirrel monkey was maintained
under an 8-min fixed-interval (FI) schedule of electric-shock delivery."
"A similar depression of respiration was not observed in the
increase responding in a nonhuman primate, the chimpanzee, and that
the behavioral effects of morphine in the chimpanzee are qualitatively
different from the effects in monkeys." Larry Byrd: a lifetime spent abusing animals. Rick Bogle, 1997 (revised, 2002)
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